A Leave of Absence

It’s been a long year.

Well, almost a year.

The last time I posted anything on here, I was in a semi-good place with my life and I was slowly getting stronger. The depression was lessening day by day and I was coming to realize that my life wasn’t really as bad as it could be.

I was on the road to recovery.

Since then, I feel like I’ve taken 5 steps forward and 10 steps back. That is why I am back here, to complain about the tiny little mishaps in my life, and some of the big ones. To let you- my beautiful online world of strangers who share with me some of the same feelings- in on the most personal aspects of my life, and to hope that some of my more optimistic posts help you in your own pursuit of happiness.

There have been good days and bad in the past year. Lately, there have been more bad then good but I refuse to allow myself to fall back into the awful pit of despair that I used to call my home away from home. In the past year I’ve lost friends, I’ve lost loves, and at some points I lost all hope for better days. But I’m not ready to give in just yet. I used to think that my life wasn’t worth fighting for, that I wasn’t ever going to amount to anything and being on this planet was a waste, but that is not true. I don’t believe that it’s true for anyone. We were all put on this earth for a reason, maybe we aren’t sure of what that reason is right now but we don’t have to figure it out right away. Some people never really do, but it’s important not to give up trying to find it, that little niche where you belong, because it’s out there.

This past year, I have had to remind myself of that. I’ve gone through so many hardships with friends, family, and life in general, that I found myself literally ready to throw myself off of my balcony and be done with it all. I had hit rock bottom, and while it pained me to know that no one was there to catch me or to help me get back up, I realized something: no one was going to come to my rescue. I’d been playing the damsel in distress for far too long and this wasn’t one of those Hollywood movies where the knight in shining armor was going to show up to save me from the fire-breathing dragon, I had to be the hero of my own life story for once.

So, I needed to take a leave of absence. Am I fully cured of my depression and my suicidal thoughts? No, definitely not. There are always going to be situations in my life that are going to bring up those feelings, I know that, but the perspective I’ve gained is that no matter what happens in life there is going to be some reason for you to stay. It might be small, it might be so minuscule that you’re just barely hanging on by a thread of hope, but you’ll cling to it like your life depends on it, because it does.

Just remember (my favorite group of cyber strangers I’ve ever come across),  no matter how bleak and pointless life seems, things will get better. After all, when you’ve hit rock bottom, there is nowhere to go but up.